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Friday, April 27, 2012

Ambulance Response Times in 21st Century America

Ambulance Response Times in 21st Century America- or " I called 20 minutes ago, where the hell is the ambulance?"
Not long ago I read a news report about a patient who had a bad outcome because an ambulance did not reach him soon enough- a tragic but familiar story I think. Here in The City response times of 20 minutes or more are not uncommon- fortunately a good 90% of our EMS calls are horseshit, but what about that other 10%. Hmm- that's a problem.
So people let's make this short and sweet- as long as the general public continues to abuse the 911 system in the manner they currently do, and as long as EMS managers continue to misappropriate their resources, there will be times when the ambulance will not be available when you need it.
Simple math- and the system is so overloaded now that the little juggling game EMS administrators play does not work any more. No sympathy here- you folks made the problem, you fix it.